Residential Satisfaction in Renovated Historic Blocks in Two Chinese Cities

Previous studies of renovated Chinese historic blocks have predominantly emphasized the role of government and physical preservation of blocks, ignoring the interests of residents, although renovation directly influences their daily lives. To reduce this void in the literature, this study sets out to analyze the residential satisfaction in these blocks. Different from existing studies directly assessing the influence of residential attributes on residential satisfaction, following gap theory, satisfaction is assumed to be affected by the gap between a resident’s aspirations and the perceived reality. Results of the best subset regression analysis suggest that residential satisfaction is influenced not only by the residential attributes but also by residential aspirations. The smaller the gap between aspiration and reality, proportional to the aspiration, the higher the residential satisfaction. Residents with a job or living in blocks during the middle renovation stage are more likely to have higher residential satisfaction for several dimensions. The analysis of satisfaction with different residential dimensions influencing overall residential satisfaction indicates that satisfaction about housing contributes the most and work satisfaction affects it the least. Policy implications to increase residential satisfaction during the renovation process of historic blocks are discussed.